By Jason Lange
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden’s public approval rating fell to 36% this week to tie the lowest rating of his 19 months in the White House as inflation takes its toll on American life, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll completed on Tuesday.
The two-day national poll found that 59% of Americans disapprove of Biden’s job performance.
Biden’s approval rating has been below 50% since August 2021 and has hovered around its record-low since first hitting it in May, raising alarms his Democratic Party is on track to lose control of at least one chamber of Congress in the Nov. 8 midterm election. Biden’s rating fell three percentage points from 39% a week earlier.
Biden’s popularity has suffered from a surge in inflation, which rose to a 40-year high in June at 9.1%.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine helped drive fuel prices higher. The COVID-19 pandemic has hindered global supply chains.
Biden’s approval rating within his own party fell to 69% this week from 74% a week earlier. Only 11% of Republicans approve of his performance in office.
Biden’s lowest ratings have rivaled the lows of his predecessor, Donald Trump, whose popularity bottomed out at 33% in December 2017.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll is conducted online in English throughout the United States. The latest poll gathered responses from a total of 1,003 adults, including 437 Democrats and 377 Republicans. It has a credibility interval – a measure of precision – of four percentage points.
(Reporting by Jason Lange; Editing by Scott Malone and Howard Goller)
